‘I always admire it’ - Frank Lampard makes Newcastle United admission ahead of Everton clash

Eddie Howe’s side have tasted defeat just once this season with a promising start to the campaign that has included wins over Nottingham Forest, Fulham and Brentford. After a trip to Old Trafford at the weekend, Newcastle return to St James’s Park to face Frank Lampard’s Everton.

Lampard helped guide the Toffees away from relegation danger last term but a haul of ten points from ten games this season sees Everton in the bottom-half of the table. Ahead of tonight’s game, Lampard has revealed the things he ‘admires’ about Newcastle United and knows his side are in for a ‘tough’ game on Tyneside.

Lampard said: “Newcastle are a robust, hard-working, physical team as well as quality and I always admire it in a team when they have those attributes.

“We feel we have those as well but we know we’re steps behind of where Newcastle are and where we are because we know where we are at, you can feel it at the club. There is a level of optimism around because people can feel shoots of improvement, but as I say, the thing is to just keep working.

“This is a very tough match in-front of a very tough crowd. An evening game there is always going to be a big atmosphere so we need to show some personality.”

The last time Everton visited Tyneside saw them lose 3-1 in Lampard’s first Premier League match in charge of his new side. That game was also played under the lights at St James’s Park and the former Chelsea man wants to see his side show more ‘personality’ this time around.

“You have to respect them because they are a really good team. They have a fantastic manager, coaching staff, really good players and they’ve recruited well in the last two windows.

Lampard continued: “Last year we went there and it was difficult for us, we didn’t really have impact on the game and we had a few of those away from home where we didn’t have the personality, energy, legs to really contest in games.

“We’ve shown much better signs of that so hopefully we can continue with that.”